WELS Missions provides invaluable support to sister church bodies around the world as they train and prepare future pastors. Every country has a different approach to worker training, depending on resources at hand as well as the local culture. In Nigeria, two sister Lutheran church bodies work in tandem to support a joint seminary, but each synod maintains separate pre-seminaries that act as “feeder” schools. Missionary Jeff Heitsch recently visited Nigeria from February 21 until March 9. This week he shares his impressions with us:

One of the main purposes of my trip was to meet the students that are attending pre-seminary classes at both Christ the King Lutheran Church and All Saints Lutheran Church. On my first visit to Nigeria last fall, the schools were on recess so I didn’t see students and teachers in action. I made meeting the students and seeing the classes in action my main focus this time.

Missionary Dan Kroll and I flew from our home base in Cameroon into Lagos, and from Lagos we flew to the city of Uyo.  In Uyo we were picked up by our driver, Solomon George and headed to Christ the King Lutheran Church Mission House in the town of Uruk Uso.  We attended a joint Communion service at the village of Meta 1 with four other congregations from that area.

Christ the King Lutheran Church Pre-seminary

On Monday morning we were up for a quick breakfast before heading to the pre-seminary of Christ the King Lutheran Church for the opening devotion. Nine full-time students take turns leading devotions.  They also critique every devotion as far as its agreement with the Scripture text, its theme, introduction and transitions, as well as its applicability to the listeners. In addition, the students give feedback to the devotion leader on how smoothly he read the Bible verses, his command of English, his style of speaking, and his composure.

We sat in on a few lessons that their instructors gave and listened to the interaction, then Pastor Kroll and I addressed the class directly and gave our encouragement. We were able to observe devotions on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday but couldn’t stay for class since we had planned various other meetings.

All Saints Lutheran Church Pre-seminary

On Thursday morning after the opening devotion, Pastor Kroll and I headed up to the town of Ogoja, which takes about  6 to 7 hours to reach by car. Ojoga is where our other sister synod in Nigeria, All Saints Lutheran Church, has its pre-seminary. Our driver Solomon said that it used to take twelve hours to make the drive because of poor road conditions. But because significant improvements have been made to the road, we left at about 9:15 a.m. and arrived at our lodge by a little after 3:30 p.m., even with a detour around Uyo. After we checked in and got settled, we had time to run into town for some bottles of water and then get back for dinner before dark.

On Friday morning we were up early for breakfast and arrived at All Saints Lutheran pre-seminary by 8:00 a.m. We assumed that was when classes started but we were wrong … they begin at 9:00 a.m. We waited for the pre-seminary director, Pastor Sunday Orem, to arrive for the opening devotion. Each pre-seminary group does things in their own way, and the students at All Saints will not be leading devotions until their pre-seminary studies come to a close in the middle of March.

After his devotion Pastor Orem met with Missionary Kroll and me privately to explain that one of the pre-seminary textbooks the school had ordered never arrived.  Apparently the printing company was having issues with their machinery and Pastor Orem wasn’t sure how to proceed.  Pastor Kroll, who had taught this course before, shared with Pastor Orem that the lessons can be taught without each student having their own book, by highlighting key points on the blackboard and directing the students to write them down.  Missionary Kroll took advantage of the opportunity to show Pastor Orem what he meant by teaching the opening chapters of this course to the students and had fun involving them in the lecture.

That weekend we held various meetings and attended a worship service in the village of Boki, then on Monday we were back at the pre-seminary in Ogoja to observe the morning devotion and classes.  On Monday and Tuesday afternoon we traveled with President Orem to visit two rural health clinics that All Saints sponsors.  One of the clinics has been in operation for a number of years, and they have just established a second.

Our days in Nigeria were filled with classes, travel, and meetings and all too soon we were packing up for the journey back to Cameroon. We made the long drive back to Uruk Uso, then the next day after getting on the plane at Uyo and switching flights in Lagos, we arrived back home in Douala, Cameroon.

Please pray for the 9 men from Christ the King Lutheran Church and the 12 men from All Saints who will be completing their pre-seminary instructions this spring. Upon graduation from pre-seminary, these men will be assigned to rural congregations in their church bodies so that they can gain field experience. God-willing, the men from these two pre-seminaries will come together at one seminary in Uruk Uso starting in 2019.  May God watch over them and bless them and their families.

Missionary Jeff Heitsch serves as Friendly Counselor to Nigeria. He lives in Cameroon with his wife Stephanie. Read their blog at https://jsheitsch.wixsite.com/africa

Please pray for those working in fields that are ripe for harvest. Share their story, engage with future news and receive updates. Go to this link to learn more about our mission fields in Africa and how the Holy Spirit is working faith in people’s hearts  https://wels.net/serving-others/missions/africa

“Like new born babies, crave pure spiritual milk so that by it you may grow up in your salvation, now that you have tasted that the Lord in good.”   (1 Peter 2:2-3)

In 1953 WELS missionaries started working in Lusaka, Zambia.  A few years after their arrival, they had established several congregations in the Lusaka area as well as a mission station in the town of Mwembeshi.   As people joined the new church body, they wanted to share the Gospel message with their friends and families who lived in other parts of Zambia.

A civil servant working for the colonial government wanted to bring his new-found church back to his home village.  He invited Missionaries to go and visit his home village of Kawanda. This village is located in the Northwest Province of Zambia, about 1500 km (900 miles) northwest of the capital, Lusaka. Can you imagine what the roads in Central Africa were like half a century ago? In spite of the hardships of traveling such a great distance, in 1964 the LCCA established a preaching station at Kawanda village in the Northwest Province of Zambia near Kabompo (see map).  

A young man named Boaz Samalesu joined this new preaching station.  He had a taste of the pure Gospel. He saw that it “was good” and shared that message with others.  The preaching station grew to become a parish union of 5 congregations that were served by the same pastor.

The Northwest Province is not only far away from Lusaka in distance. The people who live there are very different culturally from the Tonga and Chewa speaking tribes that live near Lusaka and in the eastern part of Zambia. One conspicuous difference is their diet. In the Northwest Province farmers grow cassava as their staple food.

In Central Africa, every day people eat thick, sticky porridge called shima. Shima looks like mashed potatoes and is eaten along with various “relishes” (side dishes) of vegetables and/or meat. Most Zambians make shima from maize (corn) flour, but in the Northwest Province they use cassava flour. There is a saying about the shima made from cassava flour: “It holds your stomach.”   Cassava flour has large amounts of fiber and the shima that is made with it is much thicker in consistency than shima made with maize flour. Because your stomach takes more time to digest cassava shima it makes you feel fuller for longer time periods, thus the saying, “it holds your stomach.”

In January 2018 I met Boaz Samalesu during a visit to his home village in Manyinga, where the LCCA has recently established a new preaching station. Boaz had been waiting many years for this moment. He used to have to travel by foot and by bicycle over 30km (18 miles) to go to church in another village, but now his beloved Lutheran Church has come to his home village. Boaz never let go of the hope that someday this would happen, because the Gospel message filled his heart.  Like the cassava porridge that “holds your stomach”, Boaz held on to his hope for over 54 years.

The parish union that Boaz’s congregation belongs to is served by Zambian pastor Hastings Lubaba.  When Pastor Lubaba met Boaz and heard his story, he made the effort to visit his village. Pastor Lubaba has gathered a group and begun teaching confirmation classes.  They are holding weekly worship services in a temporary shelter and have plans for a permanent structure. Boaz tasted that the Lord is good, and now he is sharing this good food with others.  

Missionary Daniel Sargent lives in Zambia

Please pray for those working in fields that are ripe for harvest. Share their story, engage with future news and receive updates. Go to this link to learn more about our mission fields in Africa and how the Holy Spirit is working faith in people’s hearts  https://wels.net/serving-others/missions/africa

I didn’t know what he meant.

I heard his words but I didn’t grasp his message.  I wondered what he was really saying. What was the meaning behind the words?  Was he even talking to me? Or to someone else? Or was he just talking to himself?  Three times he repeated the same thing:

“Now I believe.”

I was a bit uncertain about his words because I had just walked up to him.  His name is Bright Pembeleka. He is the pastor of Beautiful Savior Lutheran Church in Blantyre, Malawi.  He’s been serving in the public ministry for 13 years. 

We both had come to the same place:  the mortuary. We were collecting the body of a Lutheran Church member.  Pastor Pembeleka has been there before. Many times.

As a pastor he knows the routine all too well when someone dies: visiting the family, preparing the sermon, leading the worship, saying the prayers, conducting the burial service. But this time was different.  Powerfully different. Life-changingly different.

This time he would not wear the robe of a preacher but the cloak of grief.  The Lutheran member who passed away wasn’t just a church member, the person was his own daughter.  Edina was twenty-one years old. Just… twenty-one!

It’s not supposed to happen this way! But it did.

Watching one coffin after another being carried out of the mortuary and being placed into waiting vehicles reminded me once again: The old must die.  The young can.

We waited while the embalmers did their job.  Sensing an opening in the conversation, I risked asking Pastor Pembeleka what he meant by what he said, “Now I believe.”  His explanation came freely though heavily; it didn’t just land in my ears it settled in my heart:

I have officiated at a lot of funerals. I did so because it was my job.  It was part of my work. But now it is happening to me. Now is really the first time I know what it means to grieve.  Now I am the one experiencing the pain. Now I know the heart-ache that others have talked about.

Now.  I. FEEL.”

His eyes were reddening with tears.  His voice was cracking with sorrow. His heart was breaking with pain. The cloak he wore was both dark and heavy.

Now I believe.

Grief seized him and gripped him.  He and his wife and children would now be the ones to weakly stand, then kneel beside the pile of fresh dirt.  Even fall upon it.

Maybe you’ve been there.  Waiting at the mortuary. Visiting at the funeral home.  Walking the path to the grave. Placing a wreath of flowers. If so, you understand.  If not, you likely will. Because sooner or later death touches the ones we love.

The cloak is dark and heavy.

Pastor Pembeleka would be at the funeral, but this time he wouldn’t be leading the service.  Others would: His brothers in Christ. Fellow servants. Seasoned preachers. A band of disciples who gathered, supported, encouraged, prayed and rallied around their grieving brother and family.

Some of whom have buried their own children. They know.  They have experienced. They understand. They FEEL. They believe.

They gave what they had and what they had was what was needed most:  the Word of God. After all, it had something to say to Pastor Pembeleka, his wife, his children3 and everyone there.  It has something to say to you who weren’t:  At a Christian funeral, GRIEF isn’t the only cloak worn on such days!  So is the robe righteousness. The mantle of God’s grace. God has draped his people with a love that seizes and grips and doesn’t let go.

In death there is life! (John 11:25, 26)

Most fittingly, Pastor Eliya Petro chose and preached on the assuring words found in John’s first letter: ”God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son.  He who has the Son has life…” (1 John 5:11, 12) Edina has life because the Son has her!

A chorus of Lutheran women, uniformed in purple and white, confidently sang that truth again and again as they walked in a long double line to the funeral house, “She’s in the hands of God, yes, she’s in the hands of God.”

She is… because Jesus has conquered death!

She is… because Jesus lives!

She is… because Jesus has taken away her sin!

Pastor Pembeleka, you and your brothers have taught your congregations well.  The people, whether sitting in the pew at church or sitting on the ground in a graveyard or kneeling close to the pile of dirt, have heard the life-giving gospel of Jesus Christ from you.  Week after week. Sermon after sermon. Service after service. Funeral after funeral. Look around, dear brother. The gospel has done miraculous and marvelous things!

The people are expressing the very faith that God has given them.  They are sharing the good and comforting news of Jesus with you and your family when you are the one grieving, the one paining, the one sorrowing, the one experiencing.  They are serving you, standing with you when you are the one feeling.

Thank you, Pastor, for showing your humanness.  Your frailty. Your need. Thank you for sharing your pain and your sorrow and your tears.  When we are weak, then we are strong. (2 Corinthians 12:10)

Now I believe.

In my weakness and God’s strength,

Missionary John Holtz, Malawi

Please pray for those working in fields that are ripe for harvest. Share their story, engage with future news and receive updates. Go to this link to learn more about our mission fields in Africa and how the Holy Spirit is working faith in people’s hearts  https://wels.net/serving-others/missions/africa

 

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